Profile
Price Range: $$
Accepts Credit Cards: yes
Attire: casual
Good for kids: yes
Take out: yes
Waiter Service: yes
Outdoor seating: no
Alcohol: no
Rating
Food Quality: 4 out of 5
Decor: 3.5 out of 5
Service: 3 out of 5
Overall: 3.5 out of 5
Recommendation: Tasty Yunnan Cuisine
Review
Yun Dian is a restaurant serving Yunnan cuisine. They are located on the alley right behind the Zhongxiao SOGO. The restaurant was packed during dinner, so this seems to be a popular spot in the area. I have not had authentic Yunnan Cuisine before so I would not know how to rate or recommend this place based on authenticity. They serve a variety of rice noodle soups, "loose" buns, and other Yunnan dishes. The prices for each dish are bearable and does not exceed 200 for an entree. I will need to try other Yunnan delicacies before I can make an educated opinion on this restaurant.
The interior of the restaurant is pretty small so it will be very packed. You will need to try to become comfortable being very close to other parties while dining here. The servers scurry around their duties, and so you may need to flag down one if you are in need of something. Don't expect that you can be waited on in a luxurious way. However, they do their job seating, ordering, and bringing your food.
This restaurant seems to be constantly steaming up what they call loose buns. It kind of looks deceptively like a regular bao, but in fact it is not as dense and chewy as a regular bao. It is kind of flakey and fluffy instead of being fluffy and spongy. They have various filling for their bao, even red bean fillings for dessert.
One of their sides is a thousand year old egg tofu dish. The overall taste is like any other place's, but their egg seemed to look especially old, and they had this crusty topping that I could not tell what it was. It made an acceptable appetizer for the main entree.
Their signature dish is this "Over the Bridge" Rice Strings. They bring this hot bowl of pork bone stock with plates of ingredients for you to throw into the bowl on the spot. Basically, you get a small bowl of sliced pork, a plate of vegetables, and a plate of rice noodles. Their rice noodles are unique in that they are slightly thicker and denser than pho noodles. Also, when you bite down it is not chewy but sort of like sedimental. It is a wierd texture that is hard to describe. If you ever had 米苔目 then you can imagine a smaller strandier version of that. This dish was not bad, just sort of on the light refreshing side. No overwhelming spices, just a slightly sour pork broth with lightly blanched ingredients. I would come back and try other dishes, since it is nice to have a little variety.
No comments:
Post a Comment